- Supreme Court SC/ST judgment
The Supreme Court recalled its directions in a March, 2018 verdict that had effectively diluted provisions of arrest under the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, 1989.
- This was following a plea by the Centre seeking a review of that judgment.
Past Judgement:
- Supreme Court diluted the SC and ST (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, 1989, to grant anticipatory bail to accused persons and directed that the police conduct a preliminary enquiry into whether a complaint under the law is “frivolous or motivated” before registering a case.
- Both conditions were not part of the original legislation.
- It had reasoned that members of the Scheduled Castes and the Scheduled Tribes use the 1989 law to lodge false complaints, leading to the arrest of innocent persons.
- The March 2018 judgment triggered widespread protests and compelled the government to amend the Act to negate the effect of the ruling. It also filed a review petition against the verdict.
Recent Judgement:
- In its judgment on the review petition, Supreme Court said human failing and not caste is the reason for the filing of false criminal complaints.
- The court condemned its earlier judgment, saying it was against “basic human dignity” to treat all SC/ST community members as “a liar or crook”.
- Cleanest railway stations
Minister of Railways released the ‘Stations’ Cleanliness Survey Report’ (Cleanliness assessment of Non-suburban and Suburban Stations 2019).
About:
- Railways have been conducting third party audit and cleanliness ranking of 407 major stations annually since 2016. This year the survey was expanded to include 720 stations and suburban stations were also included for the first time.
- The total score is out of 1000 and each component (Process Evaluation, Direct Observation, Citizen Feedback) weighs 33.33% of the total score.
Key findings of the report:
- The top three cleanest railways stations are from the western state of Rajasthan. While Jaipur was on the first position, Jodhpur on second followed by Durgapura in third position.
- North Western Railway followed by South East Central Railway and East Central Railway are the top three railway zones.
- The Comprehensive National Nutrition Survey
Nearly 10% of children in the age group of 5-9 years and adolescents in the age group of 10-19 years are pre-diabetic, 5% are overweight and another 5% suffer from blood pressure.
- These are among the key findings of the first-ever national nutrition survey conducted by the Centre, yet to be made public, providing for the first time hard evidence of the coexistence of obesity and undernutrition, among school going children.
About the survey
- The Comprehensive National Nutrition Survey conducted by the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare and UNICEF between February 2016 and October 2018 is the first study undertaken to measure malnutrition, including micronutrient deficiencies through biochemical measures such as blood and urine samples, anthropometric data as well as details of non-communicable diseases such as diabetes, hypertension, cholesterol and kidney function in children and adolescents.
- The National Family Health Survey (NFHS), however, collects anthropometric data (weight for age, height for age, weight for height, mid-upper arm circumference) to measure prevalence of stunting, wasting and underweight and household dietary intake to measure deficiencies.
- Moreover, these are collected for children in the age group of 1-5 years and adults, but not for school going children between the age of 5 and 19 years.
Study highlights
- It found prevalence of indicators of non-communicable diseases alongside indicators of undernutrition shown by various NFHS surveys such as stunting, wasting and underweight.
- A quarter of 5-9 and 10-19 year-olds were thin for their age, one in five children 5-9 years’ old were stunted. A total of 1.12 lakh children and adolescents (0-19 years) were surveyed for height and weight measurements and 51,029 children (1-19 years) for biological samples.
- Health policy experts said the study showed that the government will have to focus on obesity alongside undernutrition as part of its Nutrition Mission.